Stephen A. Smith has enjoyed the fruits of Magic City’s labor, but even he believes Luke Kornet’s concerns are merited.
The Atlanta Hawks have made more news in the last week than they’ve made in years by announcing an upcoming promotion. Monday night, March 16, the Hawks will celebrate Atlanta’s famous strip club Magic City. In honor of what they described as an “iconic cultural institution,” the Hawks will pay tribute to the adult entertainment club with exclusive merchandise, Magic City’s famous lemon pepper wings, and a halftime performance by Atlanta native T.I.
Last week, Smith saw the promotion and humorously endorsed it on First Take. But this week, San Antonio Spurs center Luke Kornet wasn’t laughing when he penned a blog post suggesting the promotion should be canceled.
“The NBA should desire to protect and esteem women, many of whom work diligently every day to make this the best basketball league in the world,” Kornet wrote. “We should promote an atmosphere that is protective and respectful of the daughters, wives, sisters, mothers, and partners that we know and love.
“Allowing this night to go forward without protest would reflect poorly on us as an NBA community, specifically in being complicit in the potential objectification and mistreatment of women in our society.
“Regardless of how a woman finds her way into the adult entertainment industry, many in this space experience abuse, harassment, and violence to which they should never be subjected.”
While Kornet might struggle to attract many NBA players to his efforts, given that professional athletes have historically been more likely to visit Magic City than to condemn it, he appears to have swayed Stephen A. Smith.
“Yeah, I’ve been there,” Smith admitted during his Tuesday afternoon show on SiriusXM’s Mad Dog Sports Radio. “I don’t know many people who haven’t been there when they’ve been in Atlanta. Black, white, Hispanic, and everything in between. Magic City is Magic City…but the reality is that optics matter. And when you’re talking about the NBA signing an 11-year $77 billion deal and the inordinate amount of partners, sponsors, advertisers, etc., that connect with and associate themselves and ingratiate themselves with the NBA brand, does this have the potential to do damage to that?”
“I got two daughters,” Smith continued, “I’m not raising my daughters to work in a strip club. We gotta keep it a buck here and not be phony…There’s a lot of things that men throughout this world, have no problem with when it comes to themselves. But would have major problems with it if it were their daughter, their wife, their girlfriend, their sister, their nieces, they would have problems with it.”
“I was joking the other day when I was talking about it because I thought it was a fun story to tackle. Luke Kornet has taken the fun out of it by appropriately adding the seriousness to the situation that it deserves. Whether you agree or disagree with him, you cannot say he was wrong for bringing this up. In the society that we live in, as protective as we need to be about women, these are legitimate questions.”
Last week, Smith criticized LeBron James for his post-game attire, suggesting that players and coaches should get back to wearing suits on game day. It would seemingly be hypocritical of him to claim players and coaches need to dress more professionally while simultaneously endorsing an NBA team celebrating a strip club in their arena.
Hawks co-owner, actress, and film producer Jami Gertz produced a five-part docuseries celebrating 40 years of Magic City, which was released last summer. A blog post from Kornet may have swayed Smith, but it probably won’t convince Gertz to turn on the renowned adult entertainment club now.
As the pending promotion continues to garner commentary and headlines, it’s giving the Hawks the attention they sought. Ultimately, it will fall on Adam Silver and the NBA to acknowledge whether they welcome one of their teams promoting an adult entertainment club or disagree with what it represents.